{"id":75865,"date":"2024-08-19T09:03:34","date_gmt":"2024-08-19T13:03:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=75865"},"modified":"2024-08-19T09:03:34","modified_gmt":"2024-08-19T13:03:34","slug":"1143910_toyota-developing-in-wheel-electric-motors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/?p=75865","title":{"rendered":"Toyota developing in-wheel electric motors"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Toyota has filed a new patent application for <strong>in-wheel electric motors<\/strong>, indicating the automaker is still working on this tech.<\/p>\n<p>The patent application was published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Jul. 18, 2024, and originally filed by Toyota Oct. 30, 2023. It deals specifically with a gear-case design that uses two helical gears and thrust bearings, which Toyota claims in the application allows the gear case to withstand thrust loads on the gears with minimal weight increase.<\/p>\n<p><span id=\"static-marker-video-player-primis\"\/><\/p>\n<div class=\"image_wrapper first_wrapper\" readability=\"7\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" name=\"tccimg_100937313_m\" title=\"Toyota in-wheel motor patent image\" src=\"data:image\/png;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAD\/ACwAAAAAAQABAAACADs=\" alt=\"Toyota in-wheel motor patent image\" width=\"640\" height=\"499\" class=\"first_image lazy\" data-width=\"1024\" data-height=\"799\" data-url=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/lrg\/toyota-in-wheel-motor-patent-image_100937313_l.jpg\" data-src-h=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/hug\/toyota-in-wheel-motor-patent-image_100937313_h.jpg\" data-src=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/lrg\/toyota-in-wheel-motor-patent-image_100937313_l.jpg\" data-src-l=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/lrg\/toyota-in-wheel-motor-patent-image_100937313_l.jpg\" data-src-m=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/med\/toyota-in-wheel-motor-patent-image_100937313_m.jpg\" data-src-s=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/sml\/toyota-in-wheel-motor-patent-image_100937313_s.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Toyota in-wheel motor patent image<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>While minimizing weight is an overall virtue in automotive engineering, keeping the weight of the gear case to a minimum can help <strong>reduce unsprung mass<\/strong>\u2014one of the main drawbacks of in-wheel motors. Too much unsprung mass\u2014meaning mass not supported by the suspension, such as motors attached the wheel hubs\u2014can make tuning for ride and handling difficult.<\/p>\n<p data-pm-slice=\"1 1 []\">Patent applications are not the same as product plans but, as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.just-auto.com\/data-insights\/innovators-in-wheel-motor-drives-automotive\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Just-Auto<\/a> has pointed out, Toyota has filed a lot of patents on in-wheel motors in recent years, so it&#8217;s clearly still at work on them. Toyota has had an in-house in-wheel motor program in the past (as did General Motors), and this might suggest that it either remains active or has been revived.\u00a0<\/p>\n<div class=\"image_wrapper\" readability=\"7\"><img decoding=\"async\" name=\"tccimg_100901720_m\" title=\"Toyota Baby Lunar Cruiser concept\" src=\"data:image\/png;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAD\/ACwAAAAAAQABAAACADs=\" alt=\"Toyota Baby Lunar Cruiser concept\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" data-width=\"1024\" data-height=\"576\" data-url=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/lrg\/toyota-baby-lunar-cruiser-concept_100901720_l.webp\" data-src-h=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/hug\/toyota-baby-lunar-cruiser-concept_100901720_h.webp\" data-src=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/lrg\/toyota-baby-lunar-cruiser-concept_100901720_l.webp\" data-src-l=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/lrg\/toyota-baby-lunar-cruiser-concept_100901720_l.webp\" data-src-m=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/med\/toyota-baby-lunar-cruiser-concept_100901720_m.webp\" data-src-s=\"https:\/\/images.hgmsites.net\/sml\/toyota-baby-lunar-cruiser-concept_100901720_s.webp\" class=\"lazy\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Toyota Baby Lunar Cruiser concept<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p data-pm-slice=\"1 1 []\">Toyota highlighted <strong>in-wheel motors<\/strong> as an efficiency and packaging choice 15 years ago or more and had signaled that its iQ EV might have them in an internally developed form. It arrived with a standard inboard motor setup though. More recently, Toyota has teased in-wheel motors on its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greencarreports.com\/news\/1141072_toyota-lunar-cruiser-ev-concept-could-preview-earthbound-suv\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Lunar Cruiser concept<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p data-pm-slice=\"1 1 []\">The tech is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greencarreports.com\/news\/1139147_dongfeng-claims-world-s-first-passenger-cars-with-in-wheel-motors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">finding its way into passenger vehicles<\/a>, gradually, and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greencarreports.com\/news\/1125542_crowdfunded-aptera-super-efficiency-ev-will-use-in-wheel-motors\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Aptera is including them<\/a> as part of what it claims will be a super-efficient electric 3-wheeler, but a lot of questions about durability and safety remain. Hyundai has also teased another approach that moves an in-wheel motor design <a href=\"https:\/\/www.greencarreports.com\/news\/1141588_hyundai-and-kia-move-ev-motors-closer-to-the-wheels-but-not-in-them\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">close to the wheels but not in them<\/a>\u2014but with no clear production plans.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Toyota has filed a new patent application for in-wheel electric motors, indicating the automaker is still working on this tech. The patent application was published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) Jul. 18, 2024, and originally filed by Toyota Oct. 30, 2023. It deals specifically with a gear-case design that uses two [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":75866,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-e-cars"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=75865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75865\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/75866"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/autosector.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}